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Post by deembastille on Jul 17, 2018 18:45:20 GMT
1: yes it is the middle of the story (as a life long story). Lucas wrote the three 'prequals' first and then wrote a new hope, empire, and return of the Jedi. After looking over all of them he decided to shelve the first three because he thought the latter 3 were more interesting. 2: yeah, I get what you're saying. However, (and I found this out by a lifetime of watching it) the more you watch it, the more you are able to grasp what EXACTLY is going on. 3: yeah, there should have been more Han Solo in it. He really wrote the prequels first? I heard he’d written the whole thing as one huge story (then reworked it to fit the Campbellian monomyth more closely). What I meant is that it seems as if we start in the middle of this particular story—as if, by normal storytelling standards, we should have started with Leia’s stealing the plans or something. I don’t really mind it, though. Oh, I think I got ahold of the story fairly quickly, I just thought the opening needed a few more takes. We agree completely on 3. The Solo character is fun. Did Lucas (et al.) originally write him as a variation on Bogart? I was detecting a To Have and Have Not vibe (as I get a Casablanca vibe from Ford’s Indy, but really only in Raiders). Let me explain my 2: I saw this originally as a child and little snippets of the story made it while others we're forgotten. Or some of the story was left to my imagination. (Ex: I always thought that orb with the syringe was full of poison that would kill Leia when she fell asleep). All I know is that he produced 4-6 first because he thought the story was better.
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Post by Tristan's Journal on Jul 17, 2018 19:49:40 GMT
1: yes it is the middle of the story (as a life long story). Lucas wrote the three 'prequals' first and then wrote a new hope, empire, and return of the Jedi. After looking over all of them he decided to shelve the first three because he thought the latter 3 were more interesting. 2: yeah, I get what you're saying. However, (and I found this out by a lifetime of watching it) the more you watch it, the more you are able to grasp what EXACTLY is going on. 3: yeah, there should have been more Han Solo in it. He really wrote the prequels first? I heard he’d written the whole thing as one huge story (then reworked it to fit the Campbellian monomyth more closely). What I meant is that it seems as if we start in the middle of this particular story—as if, by normal storytelling standards, we should have started with Leia’s stealing the plans or something. I don’t really mind it, though. nah, if you believe Lucas and the official LF documentaries, he wrote the script for Star Wars first, and had to skip parts of it because the script was too long. Those left out parts eventually became part of Empire (training of Luke). Mostly the OT was made up per movie, there was never a big master plan - you notice that too by way of plot holes and character changes that certain twists and story turns caused in the OT. The prequels were just rudimentary backstory back in 73/74, Lucas at that young age would not have been able to write such an intricate dystopian story of the rise of totalitarianism and the fall of democracy, that only came later when he studied history especially Chinese history.
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Post by Nalkarj on Jul 17, 2018 19:51:33 GMT
nah, if you believe Lucas and the official LF documentaries, he wrote the script for Star Wars first, and had to skip parts of it because the script was too long. Those left out parts eventually became part of Empire (training of Luke). Mostly the OT was made up per movie, there was never a big master plan - you notice that too by way of plot holes and character changes that certain twists and story turns caused in the OT. The prequels were just rudimentary backstory back in 73/74, Lucas at that young age would not have been able to write such an intricate dystopian story of the rise of totalitarianism and the fall of democracy, that only came later when he studied history especially Chinese history. That’s what I’d heard too.
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Post by Tristan's Journal on Jul 17, 2018 19:57:39 GMT
nah, if you believe Lucas and the official LF documentaries, he wrote the script for Star Wars first, and had to skip parts of it because the script was too long. Those left out parts eventually became part of Empire (training of Luke). Mostly the OT was made up per movie, there was never a big master plan - you notice that too by way of plot holes and character changes that certain twists and story turns caused in the OT. The prequels were just rudimentary backstory back in 73/74, Lucas at that young age would not have been able to write such an intricate dystopian story of the rise of totalitarianism and the fall of democracy, that only came later when he studied history especially Chinese history. That’s what I’d heard too. it's the natural thing how a big storyline progresses. If he had planned it all ahead we would not ended up with two death stars in one trilogy, incestuous relationships and nobel knights becoming exploitative liars and hypocrites, or a central villain changing character per movie...still the urban myth of the universal master plan including 9+ chapters remains very popular...
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Post by BATouttaheck on Jul 17, 2018 20:49:18 GMT
Not having a crystal ball, Lucas did not know that Star Wars was going to become such a THING!
It was "just a movie", merely an homage to the serials he had loved as a kid with potential for a sequel because it WAS an homage to the Serials aka chapter plays of the Saturday afternoons at the Bijou. Actually, seeing his birth date, he may not actually have seen them in the theater but he certainly had seen them on television.
Phenoms happen .. they aren't really planned for and when they are, they often flop, bomb, fail !
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 1:56:19 GMT
@forceghostackbar, President Ackbar™, coldenhaulfield, Tristan's Journal, BATouttaheck, et al. So—I’m finally watching The Empire Strikes Back! And enjoying it a lot so far. Unfortunately, I checked with Uncle Save-a-Coin and he didn’t have the original version, so this one’s the new version, but I’m hoping that’s OK for a new viewer…
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 1:58:59 GMT
First observations? It feels completely different from Star Wars—the characterizations are much better, but even the picture looks different. Mise-en-scène, maybe? Lucas giving up the director’s chair? Harrison Ford seems to be more of the protagonist, at least so far—not that I’m mind, as I’m a big Ford fan!
Once again, everything feels like it’s starting in media res: I felt like I missed something between movies. It’s supposed to feel like that, right?
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Post by Deleted on Aug 17, 2018 2:10:14 GMT
First observations? It feels completely different from Star Wars—the characterizations are much better, but even the picture looks different. Mise-en-scène, maybe? Lucas giving up the director’s chair? Harrison Ford seems to be more of the protagonist, at least so far—not that I’m mind, as I’m a big Ford fan! Once again, everything feels like it’s starting in media res: I felt like I missed something between movies. It’s supposed to feel like that, right? Glad you're enjoying it so far! It's definately meant to give the impression of a slight time jump. It does not pick up where the first left off, but rather, some years later. Han is now a major part of the Rebelion and his relationship with Leia has evolved to one full of tension and attraction. Luke has reached the point where he has reached his max use for the rebels and must move on to becoming a Jedi.
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Post by President Ackbar™ on Aug 17, 2018 2:14:29 GMT
They ran into a bounty hunter on Ord Mantell !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!6
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 2:16:55 GMT
First observations? It feels completely different from Star Wars—the characterizations are much better, but even the picture looks different. Mise-en-scène, maybe? Lucas giving up the director’s chair? Harrison Ford seems to be more of the protagonist, at least so far—not that I’m mind, as I’m a big Ford fan! Once again, everything feels like it’s starting in media res: I felt like I missed something between movies. It’s supposed to feel like that, right? Glad you're enjoying it so far! It's definately meant to give the impression of a slight time jump. It does not pick up where the first left off, but rather, some years later. Han is now a major part of the Rebelion and his relationship with Leia has evolved to one full of tension and attraction. Luke has reached the point where he has reached his max use for the rebels and must move on to becoming a Jedi. Right, got it. It’s just the jump was really pretty unexpected to me. I hadn’t really noticed much of a Han-Leia attraction in the original, but they’re fun together here (Leia kissing Luke to make Han jealous! Heh). These huge robot-elephant-things on the ice planet—at the risk of a simplistic word, cool! There’s this Dalí painting they remind me of. Vader comes off as much more sinister here—like Christopher Lee’s Dracula, walking through the hallways in that black cloak while the music blasts—compared to being Peter Cushing’s underling in the first. Anyway, I’m having a lot of fun.
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 2:17:47 GMT
I’d love to see this on a big screen.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 17, 2018 2:17:59 GMT
Keep an eye out for this guy... His four seconds of screen time are pure badassery!
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 2:39:44 GMT
The swamp planet looks great—actually, many compositions in this movie look great. The only other thing I’ve seen of Kershner’s was Never Say Never Again, which I found boring, but this one is consistently more visually inventive than the Lucas film.
I found the “Darth Vader strangles guy through TV screen” sequence to be a bit silly, but so far he is, as I wrote, a much better villain. And the robots are less annoying. And… It feels like they went about taking every element and improving it. There’s the usual Harrison Ford-as-Humphrey-Bogart element (also found in Indy, as I wrote earlier today) element here that I like a lot.
Yoda just popped up.
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Post by MCDemuth on Aug 17, 2018 2:44:02 GMT
I checked with Uncle Save-a-Coin and he didn’t have the original version, so this one’s the new version, but I’m hoping that’s OK for a new viewer… I think TESB, has the least objectionable "Special Edition" changes of the three original films... There were very little "story" changes in this one. I think the most dramatic change was the "Emperor Scene" with The Emperor & Darth Vader talking about Luke Skywalker and even that one wasn't too different from the original... It was more about changing the visual look of The Emperor
The rest of the changes were more about special effect changes to either, clean up previous special effects shots that were not as good as they should have been, or it was to improve visuals, such as making Cloud City, look less like a "submarine"... Personally, I enjoyed most of these changes.
The Wampa scene at the beginning of the film, is questionable though. Some people like the concept of "Less is more scary", but Lucas wanted to see more of the creature...
But at least it doesn't change the story, which is what most fans hated about the Special Editions.
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 2:59:16 GMT
Keep an eye out for this guy... His four seconds of screen time are pure badassery! He just popped up—wow, that Crocodile-esque make-up! But who is he? Vader was asking for…what, bounty hunters to track down the Millennium Falcon? Anyway, so many impressive aliens, compositions, planets… This is so much fun.
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 3:01:59 GMT
I checked with Uncle Save-a-Coin and he didn’t have the original version, so this one’s the new version, but I’m hoping that’s OK for a new viewer… I think TESB, has the least objectionable "Special Edition" changes of the three original films... There were very little "story" changes in this one. I think the most dramatic change was the "Emperor Scene" with The Emperor & Darth Vader talking about Luke Skywalker and even that one wasn't too different from the original... It was more about changing the visual look of The Emperor
The rest of the changes were more about special effect changes to either, clean up previous special effects shots that were not as good as they should have been, or it was to improve visuals, such as making Cloud City, look less like a "submarine"... Personally, I enjoyed most of these changes.
The Wampa scene at the beginning of the film, is questionable though. Some people like the concept of "Less is more scary", but Lucas wanted to see more of the creature...
But at least it doesn't change the story, which is what most fans hated about the Special Editions. There were actual changes to the story in some of the other ones? I didn’t know that. The monster at the beginning was the “Wampa”? It looked fine, but I would have liked to have seen “less is more” (an approach with which I usually agree).
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 3:03:00 GMT
It’s sometimes difficult to remember that Yoda is actually a puppet. Puppets over CGI any day…
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Post by MCDemuth on Aug 17, 2018 3:20:32 GMT
It’s sometimes difficult to remember that Yoda is actually a puppet. Puppets over CGI any day… I saw TESB in the theater in 1980, as a kid, and I fell in love with Yoda... it was amazing at how real they made him, and the puppet still holds up visually even today! Did you know that Yoda was created with the help of Jim Henson, who created the Muppets (Kermit The Frog)? They tried using a puppet for Yoda in Episode I: The Phantom Menace, but it looked terrible... For the rest of the prequel films, they did him as CGI... Later on, they went back, and redid him in Episode I as a CGI... It does looks far better.... Somehow though, That puppet that was made 20 years earlier for TESB, was just perfect... If Lucas had turned him into a CGI Character for his Special Editions, I would have personally gone and strangled him. LOL!
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Post by Nalkarj on Aug 17, 2018 3:27:11 GMT
^^^OK, well, maybe puppets over CGI depending on the circumstances? I did know that Henson had helped out, MCDemuth, which is neat. Sometimes, yes, I can tell it’s a puppet, but it looks so damn impressive. I didn’t expect Lando’s betrayal. Interesting. Problem is, he should have been set up earlier for the betrayal to be more affecting (and effective), if that makes sense. Sorry to repeat my question from when I watched the first Star Wars, but I simply can’t grasp the politics of this world. So there’s an empire, but there’s also a pre-empire that’s not a republic (as Leia is a princess)? And the Resistance want to bring back the old monarchy, instead of this new empire? Have I got that right?
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Post by President Ackbar™ on Aug 17, 2018 3:29:11 GMT
^^^OK, well, maybe puppets over CGI depending on the circumstances? I did know that Henson had helped out, MCDemuth , which is neat. Sometimes, yes, I can tell it’s a puppet, but it looks so damn impressive. I didn’t expect Lando’s betrayal. Interesting. Problem is, he should have been set up earlier for the betrayal to be more affecting (and effective), if that makes sense. Sorry to repeat my question from when I watched the first Star Wars, but I simply can’t grasp the politics of this world. So there’s an empire, but there’s also a pre-empire that’s not a republic (as Leia is a princess)? And the Resistance want to bring back the old monarchy, instead of this new empire? Have I got that right? Leia was only a princess on her planet. There was indeed a Galactic Republic.
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